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Message: <blockquote data-quote="FireLance" data-source="post: 3512351" data-attributes="member: 3424">Here are some ideas I've had for compensating for medium and heavy armor in a low-technology world where metal armor is not available. With some tweaking (and the proviso that they only work when wearing light armor), you might be able to use them:Compensating for Medium Armor: Alternate AbilitiesDue to the low levels of technology, the characters will generally be limited to leather and hide armor. Hide armor (and most medium armors, actually) is not really very good. To compensate, characters with medium armor proficiency may select one of the following abilities instead:1. Cautious Defence: The character may move at half speed for the round in order to gain a +1 dodge bonus to AC till the start of his next turn. This option most closely simulates the trade-off between light and medium armor as it provides a small boost to AC at the cost of reduced movement. 2. Enhanced Vitality: The character gains temporary hit points equal to twice his character level at the start of each encounter. These temporary hit points last for the duration of the encounter. This option simulates the effect of having a higher AC by providing the character with a small amount of temporary hp to offset the damage taken from attacks that would otherwise have missed him due to his higher AC. 3. Sun's Flash: Once per round, as a free action, the character may make a ranged attack roll against an opponent within 30 feet. If he succeeds, the opponent is dazzled for one round. The character must be standing in an area at least as bright as a daylight spell, and must be holding or wearing a reflective object (such as a mirror or a well-polished weapon) in order to use this ability. This option imposes a small penalty on an opponent's attacks that also applies to the character's allies. To balance this, the ability is made more situational. It will not work at night, or in an area of shadow illumination, or against a creature with blindsight, for example.Compensating for Heavy Armor: More Alternate AbilitiesHeavy armor is a significant improvement over medium or light armor, so the compensatory abilities ought to be pretty good.1. Greater Cautious Defence: The character may move at half speed for the round in order to gain a +3 dodge bonus to AC till the start of his next turn. The character need not have Cautious Defence to gain this ability. A character with Cautious Defence and Greater Cautious Defence gains a +4 dodge bonus to AC in a round that he moves at half speed. 2. Erratic Defence: The character's fighting style incorporates random dodges and sudden, unpredictable changes in position. Attack rolls against the character suffer a 20% miss chance. The miss chance applies even to attacks made against the character when he is flat-footed or denied his Dexterity bonus to AC, but not when he is immobilized. A 20% miss chance effectively lowers the attacker's chance of hitting by 20%, so barring the corner cases where the attacker's attack bonus equals or exceeds the character's AC, or is 20 or more points lower, this translates into an AC bonus of between +0 to +4. In the case where the attacker's chance of hitting is exactly 50%, this reduces the chance of hitting to 40% - the equivalent of a +2 bonus to AC. 3. Parry: The character may oppose an attack roll (but not a touch attack roll) made against him with a melee attack roll. The result of his melee attack roll effectively becomes his AC against that attack. This is a reaction to being attacked (not an action), but it utilizes one of the character's attacks of opportunity for the round. The character may parry multiple times in a round if he has multiple attacks of opportunity (e.g. if he had the Combat Reflexes feat), but each subsequent attempt is made at a cumulative -5 penalty. Optional modifiers: A character parrying with a heavy shield or tower shield gains a +4 bonus on his attack roll. A character parrying with a light shield or buckler gains a +2 bonus on his attack roll. A character using a one-handed weapon to parry a two-handed weapon or a light weapon to parry a one-handed weapon suffers a -2 penalty on his attack roll. A character using a light weapon to parry a two-handed weapon suffers a -4 penalty on his attack roll. A character suffers a cumulative -2 penalty on his attack roll for each size category he is smaller than his attacker. This option gives a character an even chance of negating one attack per round from an opponent of equal skill. This ability is less useful against multiple opponents and opponents with multiple attacks. Combat Reflexes helps somewhat against multiple attacks, but suffers from rapidly diminishing returns.</blockquote>

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